The Hills Run Red DVD Review
The Hills Run Red DVD Review
Action… CUT!
|
Not unlike John Carpenter's Masters of Horror series episode from a few years back ("Cigarette Burns"), The Hills Run Red follows young, eager film students on their quest to locate and watch an infamous "lost film" from an iconic, enigmatic horror auteur who's been missing for decades.
Tyler (Tad Hilgenbrink) is the true encyclopedic cineaste of the trio, but his two pals Lalo (Alex Wyndham) and Serina (Janet Montgomery) are more than up for the challenge when Tyler decides to document their hunt for not only The Hills Run Red reels, but also to find and interview the movie's mysterious maker, Wilson Wyler Concannon (William Sadler).
As luck would have it, they quickly find Concannon's discarded daughter, sexy bottle blonde Alexa (Sophie Monk), working in a strip club. She may not be able to keep clothes on her body or drugs out of her veins, but she's got a brain for routes that's better than a GPS. It takes little convincing and before long she's leading the video camera-toting trio to the last-known filming location of The Hills Run Red. (Which is, of course, deep in the middle of a lonely wood.)
The movie within-the-movie — made in the early 80s but never put in wide release because it was pulled from theaters quickly due to its shocking and controversial content — is not especially impressive. There's some really sketchy CGI (which didn't even exist in that era) in one of the death scenes; the killer, Babyface (Raicho Vasilev), isn't terribly awe-inspiring; there's nothing so compelling about the clips as to be the stuff of legend. It just doesn't seem as though anyone would be compelled enough to go to such lengths to seek it out. (I concede the reasons do pan out in the end, though.) There are plot holes in the whole of the actual movie, The Hills Run Red… and yet, I really liked it.
Much credit can go to director Dave Parker for not only being able, but for being able to surround himself with talented people. Screenwriters David J. Schow and John Dombrow have a knack for knowing how film-geeks think and speak; DP Ilan Rosenberg makes the most of the expansive locations and intricate sets, plays up bloody red color palette, and helps the actors look great; furthermore, key makeup artist Yana Stoyanova makes them all look terrible as needed. The monster's ravaged face, as well as the victims' flesh-tears, gore-soaked hair, bloody bodies and the general grand-guignol gunk is accomplished with gritty finesse. The editing (Harold Parker) is also noteworthy.
The characters are not especially well-drawn (which is fine; I don't expect Tarantino'esque tang from a direct-to-disc slasher flick like The Hills Run Red), but the actors are up to the task in bringing a layer or two of likability. They aren't just a pack of smart-asses you can't wait to watch die horribly. Certainly Sadler is the best-cast as the devilish director and rather than sleepwalking through the frames on his way to the pay window, he really seems to relish his role. It's a small but essential one, and it's nice to see that he took Concannon seriously. He chews more scenery than a chainsaw in the forest, and it's a pleasure to see.
It's also nice that, while loaded with genre clichés, The Hills Run Red is still somehow refreshing in its non-winking approach to the horror aspects. Yes, good old slasher flick formulas are mentioned in the dialogue, but as I said: for the most part, the characters aren't snarky, pop-culture aware products of the 90210 2.0 generation. What's more, there isn't any scatological humor or overt, in-joke winks at the camera. Not to say it's serious, either — this is no Martyrs — but I like the balance this movie strikes.
= = =
Reviewed by Staci Layne Wilson